


The Time Kakashi-Sensei Was Bloody Late In The Most Literal Way

by ihopethelightwillshineupon



Category: Naruto
Genre: Gen, Hurt Hatake Kakashi, Hurt/Comfort, It's Naruto's POV so it's not super serious, Whump, nothing gory though, rated t for blood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-12
Updated: 2020-04-12
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:01:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23595013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ihopethelightwillshineupon/pseuds/ihopethelightwillshineupon
Summary: Kakashi, injured and exhausted after a dangerous mission, just wants to get back home and sleep for a week. He’s barely managed to walk back to Konoha when his body decides to be a total douchebag and completely runs out of energy, forcing him to find the nearest safe place before he passes out on the road.Naruto, up until that moment sleeping soundly in his bed, gets the socks scared off of him three times: when some weirdo knocks on his door in the middle of the night, when that weirdo turns out to be his sensei, and when Kakashi then pretty much collapses into his apartment.It’s a very stressful night.
Relationships: Hatake Kakashi & Uzumaki Naruto
Comments: 25
Kudos: 276





	The Time Kakashi-Sensei Was Bloody Late In The Most Literal Way

Naruto’s apartment had always been a haven of peace for the boy.

It wasn’t always _quiet_ per se. For some reason, birds always flocked to his roof with dozens at a time, waking him at five in the morning. And when he was younger, there’d been mornings that he’d awoken to the sound of a window breaking – the people of the village weren’t always as kind to him.

Nevertheless, his apartment was one of the only places where he truly felt safe, the other places being the Academy and Ichiraku’s and also wherever his senseis may be. His apartment was home, and it was safe. For most of the night, he could sleep soundly, until the birds or his alarm woke him up.

Tonight, though, something was wrong.

Naruto woke up to silence. His alarm clock told him it was two in the morning. Which meant that there was plenty of time to go back to sleep before training. But something kept him from closing his eyes again. The hairs on the back of his neck were standing upright, and not from the cold; it was summer. No, something was definitely up. And his ninja instincts shouldn’t be ignored.

He cast his eyes carefully around his bedroom. It was empty. Apart from the curtains, which fluttered lightly in the breeze, nothing moved. Naruto slipped out of bed, leaving his slippers so that he could walk silently.

He hadn’t even left his bedroom yet when a dull knocking sounded from his front door. With his ears already accustomed to the silence, the noise startled him. He froze in his tracks. What should he do? Definitely not open the door, but should he hide? Should he prepare to fight back? Here, in his apartment, in his pajamas?

Plus, there was the question of who would come to attack him this late at night. Naruto couldn’t really remember picking a fight with anyone in particular recently, and if he had, then he was sure that he’d beaten that person. Could be Sasuke’s brother. If that was the case, maybe it was better to hop out of the window and alert someone else.

The knocking on the door sounded again. Whoever it was, they couldn’t come in. Or maybe it was a distraction. Naruto kept his eyes on the window and made a jump for his weapons pouch, which was lying on his nightstand.

His guard was up. He didn’t know who was attacking him, or why, or what their numbers were. He had to be ready to defend himself. So there he stood, in the middle of his bedroom, barefoot and with a kunai in each hand.

Then, a voice sounded from the front door.

“Naruto?”

It was a man’s voice, strained with exhaustion. Still, even with how much quieter he sounded, Naruto recognized him immediately.

“Kakashi-sensei?” he called back. His feet seemed glued to the floor at this new twist. Was this a transformation jutsu? A hostage situation? Maybe a genjutsu? Naruto brought his hands together and whispered “release” to himself. Nothing changed.

“That’s right,” Kakashi’s voice sounded from behind the front door. He sounded muffled, even more so than usual, as if he was leaning his face against the wall. “Could you please let me in? I’d take the window, but I… sort of can’t.”

Naruto’s mind was racing. In the midst of all those thoughts, a memory resurfaced of something Iruka-sensei had once told him. If he wasn’t sure if he was dealing with an imposter, he should ask something that only the real person would know. “Sensei?” he called, slowly walking closer to the door. “Can I ask you something before I open the door?”

“Go ahead.”

“Do you remember the fight against Zabuza, on the bridge in the Land of Waves?” Naruto swallowed, unsure what he’d do if Kakashi-sensei gave the wrong answer. “You called me something to Zabuza. Some nickname. What was it?”

A chuckle sounded from the other side of the door – he sounded genuine, for as far as Naruto could judge. “I believe I called you our Number One Hyperactive Knucklehead Ninja.”

Naruto undid the five locks on the door and opened up, but didn’t put his kunai down. On the other side, on the barely lit porch, Kakashi-sensei waited, leaning against the doorway. He gave a smile at Naruto’s confused face. “Good morning.”

Then, he toppled forward. Like a dead tree.

Naruto caught his sensei by the shoulders, dropping his kunai in the process. He silently thanked his fast reflexes for keeping his sensei from smacking face-first into the floor and keeping himself from accidentally stabbing him. “Sensei?” he asked, struggling to keep the taller man upright. “Are you okay?”

Kakashi huffed – at least he wasn’t unconscious, so that was a relief. “Sorry about that. I hadn’t meant to lose my balance.”

“I sure believe that,” Naruto mumbled from underneath him. “Can you stand? You’re heavy.”

“I’ll… I’ll try.” Kakashi slowly straightened up until he was standing on his own feet again. Naruto noted the way his hand automatically moved to clutch at his midriff, but it wasn’t easy to see anything beyond that in the dark.

Naruto studied him for a moment, noticed the way he wobbled on his feet. “You should probably go sit down,” he said. “I trust you know your way around, with how often you’ve randomly intruded into my house?”

Kakashi nodded and limped off into the small living room. Naruto watched him leave with a frown, then gave the porch one last check for enemies that might be following Kakashi and locked the door again. He ran back into his bedroom and closed the window, too, just to be sure.

Kakashi, in the meantime, had found his way to the living room couch, where he seemed to be working hard on catching his breath. Naruto observed him for a moment from the doorway before walking in and flicking on the lights.

His sensei sat curled into himself, not in his usual slouch but completely folded around his stomach. He held his arms wrapped around his midriff and breathed shallowly, quickly, as if he’d just halted after running for a long time.

He looked up when Naruto walked in, his posture possibly becoming even more tense. Naruto didn’t even give him the chance to say something – he was worried, now, and he needed answers. “You avoided the question earlier,” Naruto said. “I asked if you’re okay.”

Kakashi only responded with a wry smile, making Naruto’s gut twist. “You’re hurt, aren’t you?” he asked.

“Unfortunately, you’re not wrong.” Kakashi shifted, his eye squeezing shut in pain with the movement. “I’m really sorry for waltzing into your apartment in the dead of night. I’d been walking for a long time. I knew I wouldn’t make it home without resting. Your house was the nearest place I knew was safe. I’ll leave as soon as I can.”

Naruto blinked at him. “You’re hurt and you needed a place to lay down,” he repeated slowly, “and you’re _apologizing_ for that? Jeez, sensei. People’ve woken me up for way stupider reasons. It’s not like you’ve got something to be sorry about.” He scratched at the back of his head. “It’s not like I’m going to kick you out or anything. You can sleep here, if you need it.”

Some of the tension drained from Kakashi’s posture – damn, he must really be anxious if he thought that Naruto was just going to throw him out. “Thank you.”

“Don't worry about it.” Naruto straightened up and gestured to Kakashi’s chest. “Worry about that injury instead. Do you need the first aid kit, or is it, like, broken bones or something?”

Kakashi shifted again and slowly pulled his arms away from his midriff, exposing the clothes underneath.

They were soaked in blood.

“Oh, boy,” Naruto whispered. “I’ll… get the first aid kit, I guess.”

Naruto’s first aid kit was very basic – a store-bought item that Iruka-sensei had once given him, the anxious wreck. He’d hardly ever used it; he didn’t get hurt easily. It was tucked away in a kitchen cabinet. Naruto had to crawl onto the kitchen counter to be able to reach it.

When he got back to the living room, Kakashi had taken his jacket off and appeared to be recovering from that, his hands knotted in the front of his sweater as he panted. Naruto silently put the first aid kit on the couch next to him, where he could reach it. Kakashi nodded his head in thanks.

They sat in silence for a moment, neither of them moving or speaking. Then, Kakashi pulled himself together and took a pair of scissors from the first aid kit. His hands shook, making the blades reflect light everywhere.

Naruto gave him an anxious look. “What’re you doing?”

“I need to cut open my sweater,” he replied, raising an eyebrow. “Is something wrong?”

Naruto looked at his clueless face, then at the scissors in his trembling hands, imagined how horribly one could cut themselves with badly handled scissors, and said: “Sensei, please don’t.”

It took about half a minute of arguing before Kakashi let Naruto cut open the sweater. It was an easy task to slice the piece of clothing in two; Naruto realized that they hadn’t been arguing about efficiency, but about Kakashi’s dignity, which was dumb.

The problem that they ran into, was the fact that Kakashi wore a T-shirt underneath the sweater. And the T-shirt was stuck to the wound.

Naruto clicked his tongue and looked up to Kakashi. “Now what?” he asked.

Kakashi shrugged. It seemed like a relaxed gesture, but his jaws were clenched underneath his mask. “You can put the scissors away. They’re no use, anyway.”

“Yeah.” And Naruto looked away for a single second, which made him _just_ too slow to stop Kakashi from suddenly and violently yanking the T-shirt away from his wound.

Kakashi doubled over immediately, gasping for breath. For a moment, Naruto thought that he was going to throw up which he imagined would’ve been a terribly terrible experience with a mask on, but then Kakashi turned and said quietly, but unmistakably proud of himself: “That worked, I suppose.”

Naruto, no longer frozen, waved his hands around exasperatedly. “ _Why?_ ” he shouted at Kakashi’s face. “ _Why_ would you do that?”

“I needed to get the T-shirt loose from the wound,” he replied. He gestured towards Naruto’s hands with his chin, trying to change the subject. “Watch the scissors, please.”

“You couldn’t’ve done that more carefully?!”

“That would’ve hurt more.” Kakashi turned away from him, briefly squeezing his eyes shut. The edges of his masked were soaked with sweat. “Doesn’t matter. It’s done.”

Now that there was no T-shirt covering the wound and no big sweater to catch the blood, it was far clearer how badly Kakashi was bleeding. His arms, now wrapped around his bare midriff, quickly became slippery with blood. Naruto frowned at him. “Are you sure I shouldn’t drag you to the hospital?” he asked. “’Cause if you keep bleeding like that, I _will._ ”

“Hm.” Kakashi clearly wasn’t listening. Some blood dripped down his forearms, landing on his pants and on the floor. He stared at it as if hypnotized, eyes glassy.

Naruto hovered closer, trying to meet his gaze. “You okay, sensei?” he asked. “You’re not gonna pass out, are you?”

“Not sure,” Kakashi managed. “Bleeding pretty bad.”

“That’s why you shouldn’t suddenly rip fabric away when it’s stuck to a large wound.” Naruto tried to be annoyed, but his heart wasn’t in it. “You probably shouldn’t move too much. I’ll bandage you up.”

It took lots of cotton and lots of gauze and two entire rolls of bandage before the blood finally stopped seeping through. Kakashi really was hurt pretty horribly; it appeared that some blade had slashed right through the protection of his jacket and left a broad cut square across Kakashi’s midriff and abdomen. It didn’t seem deep enough to be dangerous, but Naruto could imagine that it hurt awfully. If Kakashi was planning on letting it heal on its own for whatever reason, it’d probably need stitches, but Naruto had never stitched a wound before and did _not_ want to try it out right now. He’d carefully pulled the wound shut with tape, hissing in sympathy pain the whole time.

While Naruto worked on bandaging the wound, Kakashi’s breathing regulated a little. At least he didn’t seem to be on the verge of passing out, anymore. Naruto talked a little as he pulled out a new roll of bandage, both to distract himself from the fact that he was super scared and to distract Kakashi from the fact that he was about to pull the bandage tighter.

“Hey, sensei,” he said. “I’m curious.”

“Hm?”

“What happened, exactly?”

Kakashi hummed. “Mission.”

“Must’ve been some mission.”

“S-rank. The rest’s classified.” He hissed as Naruto pulled at the bandage. “Careful.”

“Sorry.” Naruto looked back at what he was doing. “Do you think you’re gonna be okay? I mean, I get that you’re a big and strong Jonin, but it’s not exactly a paper cut you’ve got.”

Kakashi laughed at his student’s huffy tone, instinctively flinching as the laughter shook his stomach. “I’ll stop by the hospital in the morning,” he replied. “I don’t think I can take even a single more step right now.”

“Right,” Naruto replied, suddenly remembering. “You said you’d been walking for a long time. But why not teleport right into the hospital? Or into bed?”

Kakashi shrugged, his face behind the mask twisting into a wry expression. “Like I said, S-ranked mission,” he said. “It wasn’t easy. There’s just enough chakra in me left to keep me conscious, let alone to use any jutsu.”

“Oh.” Naruto tried to imagine it; walking back to Konoha from who knows how far, wounded and physically exhausted, and knowing that he wouldn’t make it home before he’d collapse. “That sounds pretty awful.”

“I’ve had worse. But, yeah, it sucked and I’m really glad I don’t have to walk back home after this. Thanks for that.” He yawned. “On that note, are you almost done? I might fall asleep sitting up.”

“Almost.” Naruto pulled the ends of the bandage into a knot, tight enough so the bandage wouldn’t unravel but not tight enough to hurt. “That’s all, I guess.”

“Thank you.”

Naruto nodded at him and stood up, taking the first aid kit with him. “I’ll leave you alone so you can sleep, now,” he said, stifling a yawn himself. “I’m gonna try to sleep a bit, too. If you need something, just shout.”

“I can handle myself. You shouldn’t worry too much. I’ve disrupted your rest enough as it is.” Kakashi slowly lay down on his back, wincing with the movement. “Good night.”

“Alright. G’night, sensei.” Before Naruto walked into the kitchen, he stopped in his tracks. “Oh, one more thing. I’ve set an alarm for training tomorrow, at seven. I’m guessing I should turn that off?”

Kakashi lifted his head off of the couch to look at Naruto incredulously. “Please take one look at me and ask me _again_ if there’s training at seven.”

“Okay, okay. Good point. ‘Night, sensei.”

“Good night.”

The next morning, around eleven o’clock, Naruto helped Kakashi walk to the hospital, where he got sufficiently healed up. He was still exhausted, though, so training was cancelled for the day. Naruto spent the day training by himself, outside.

When he came home, he found that the blood on his floor and couch had been cleaned off. And to figure out who was responsible of that… well, that was an easy guess.

-END-

**Author's Note:**

> Yo!
> 
> I’ve only recently started watching Naruto and I’ve been racing through it at top speed (I’m at episode 121 of the first series right now). I felt like I haven’t watched enough to write a longer fic, but I like this series a lot so I had to write _something_. It’s just something small and dumb that doesn’t mention any important plot details that I might get wrong.
> 
> That’s all for now! Bye! :)


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